Track & Field
Favorite athlete: Anna Hall
Favorite team: Philadelphia Eagles
Favorite memory competing in sports: Districts 2024 when I made states for the first time
Music on playlist: Country
Future plans: To continue track at Duquesne University while studying nursing
Words to live by: “Set goals beyond your reach so you always have something to live for.”
One goal before turning 30: Be happy with a job I love
One thing people don’t know about me: Outside of track, my favorite thing to do is play pickleball with my friends
By GORDON GLANTZ
The fact that Central Bucks South senior Devlyn Faber is one of the top triple jumpers in the district, if not the state, is a classic study in fate.
Close friend and teammate Erika Dombroski was not available for the triple jump for the North Penn Invitational last year, and Faber was asked to fill in by her coaches.
Always a team player, the two-year captain gave it a go.
To say the experiment was a success would be an understatement, as she qualified for districts.
“They had me do it for the one week she was gone, as a filler, and I ended up being decent at it,” said Faber. “I loved doing it. I tried it for the rest of the season, and I made districts at our first invitational.”
Then, at the damp and dreary District One meet at Coatesville, the sun was again shining on Faber as she qualified for states.
“Even going into districts, I was seeded really low,” said Faber. “I had absolutely no expectations. That’s one of the reasons it was so awesome. Even my coaches were, like, ‘What the heck just happened?’ I ended up placing fifth in District One and top 5 gets you into states.
“That was a really fun day. It was raining. It was terrible weather. I did well in terrible weather, so I was so proud of myself.”
Faber, who also participates in the high jump and long jump and now runs a leg in the successful 4X100 relay, has been able to parlay her triple jump skills into an opportunity to do it on the collegiate level at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh.
“It was all really unexpected,” she said. “My main event now is the triple jump, and I only really started like a year ago.”
On a Mission
While she did not medal at states last year, Faber is determined to come away from states this year with hardware.
“That’s definitely the goal,” she said. “I was disappointed in my performance last year at states. It was the first meet I had been to of that caliber. I was happy to be able to go. I was proud of myself, after having only just started it a month before, but I was also disappointed.
“I said, ‘Next year, I’m going to come back and I’m going to know what it’s like to be here.’”
Faber missed medaling during this past winter’s indoor season by a mere half-inch, which only added more fuel to her fire.
“I knew I could have done so much better, but that made it even more frustrating for me,” said Faber. “I said, ‘I’m going to outdoor states, and I’m going to medal.’ I really want one. I think it’s more than within reach.”
Her head coach, Jason Gable, sees no reason why Faber can’t achieve this lofty goal.
“Last year, it was about getting the experience at states,” said the coach of more than two decades. “This year, it’s all about medaling. She is setting herself up for that. She is in that medal contention already across the state.”
Legacy of Leadership
Faber, the eldest of the Cheryl and Frank Faber’s three children, has developed a natural take-charge persona.
She admits it has a lot to do with being a big sister to Emme and Cade on the home front.
“Oh, definitely,” she said. “With my siblings, I’ve always been in charge of them and shown them what to do. I guess I can be bossy sometimes. That’s what I’ve done my whole life, so that’s what I do in sports.”
Within the team framework, Faber was a sophomore when she “adopted” Dombroski, and they have since brought Ella Parish under their wing.
“We’ve been so close,” she said of her bond with Dombroski. “She was like my little freshman when I was a sophomore. We’ve grown up together. We’ve watched each other succeed and fail. She is one of my biggest supporters, especially on the team.”
The connection with her teammates extends behind that trio, as Faber is a two-year captain.
“Ever since I was a kid, I’ve always kind of taken charge of things,” said Faber. “I like to make sure that people know what they are doing at practice and everything. I think a lot of people need the guidance to succeed, and I really want to see everybody succeed. It’s been pretty easy for me. I just gravitate toward taking charge, I think.”
From his viewpoint, Gable sees a level of caring from Faber than sets her apart as a leader.
“She’s a natural leader,” he said. “Nothing is really forced. There’s calm communication and correction from her during meets and in practice. It’s hanging out after practice, sometimes with stretching. She is a leader to the entire team, even with the sprinters, but especially with the jumpers. She is almost like a mother hen.”
Faber can only chuckle and agree with the description.
“People joke and call me the mom of the group, that’s for sure,” she said. “We are like a little family.”
While he will miss Faber next year not only for her track and field talent but also her leadership, Gable says a piece of her spirit will always live on.
“When she came on the team, we had some phenomenal leadership – especially in the jumpers on the girls’ side – and Dev very much became attached to those juniors and seniors and learned from them,” said Gable. “It shows now. All that motivation and connection and love for the sport that she saw as an underclasswoman in high school, she is now sharing with those underneath her.
“I’ve been doing this for 21 years. Where athletes like Dev leave their mark is that it almost becomes like a seamless transition. There will be another girl stepping into that role and making Dev proud by providing the same leadership and the same amount of hard work and level of competing. That means the same level of enthusiasm.”
Though an individual sport, Gable is impressed with how Faber puts the team first and in how she carries herself.
“Even if Dev has a bad day jumping, she is still proud of what she did,” he said. “She is still proud of stepping on the runway and proud of working hard. She knows that not every day is going to be the best. I will see that in other girls that will take her place. That’s the true mark that I want to see these girls leave.”
That translates in a legacy of leadership.
“Next year, we will talk to a new girl about the girl that, God willing, medaled at states -- and in the Penn Relays -- in the triple jump,” said Gable. “Those are the stories we will be telling the new girls about what hard work, focus and determination will get you.”
Faber is naturally still a bit hesitant about projecting too far ahead about how she will be remembered.
“I haven’t thought about too much because I get kind of sad when I think about the idea that I’m leaving, but I’m hoping they really remember me,” she said. “That goes especially for the younger girls. I hope that when think of me when they are seniors, that they want to be leaders.
“It’s been a balance between being a nice fun teammate to being a captain who has to reprimand them sometimes when things aren’t getting done. I hope that people will think of me in years to come when they think of what they want a real leader to me.”
The Big Leap
Buoyed by her strong junior season, Faber began to realize that competing at the next level could be a reality.
The goal-oriented Faber, who tracks her successes and failures with sticky notes on a big board behind her desk at home, knew she had to chase down the dream.
“I just emailed so many coaches over the summer,” she said. “Nothing really stuck until the end of the year, and I started hearing back. Some of them were then reaching out to me.”
Among them was Shannon Taub, Duquesne’s jumping coach. Like Faber, she came to discover triple jumping late while a student at Council Rock South.
In “Coach Shannon,” Faber felt like found a kindred spirit.
“There was a really nice connection between the two of us,” said Faber. “She was in the same situation, too. She started triple jump at the end of her junior year. She was the first coach that really gave me a shot. She realized I had the potential. She looked at the numbers and said, ‘Not quite yet,’ but she looked at what they could be. She related it back to how it was for her, and that was the biggest thing for me.”
Faber believes that she can reach her full potential at the collegiate level, and that’s all she asks.
“I’m really excited,” said Faber. “I know I have so much in me, especially with another level of training. My high school coaches are amazing, and I couldn’t have done it without them, but there is going to be a complete other level. It’ll come from just having a lifting schedule and having the resources behind you.”
Gable concurs that the best is yet to come for Faber.
“Completely,” said Gable, a former collegiate athlete himself. “Our job, as high school coaches, is to set the kids up to be successful later in life. When you have kids who want to continue to compete at the college level, our job is to prepare them for that next level.
“While I want Dev to gives us the best that she can give us right now, I want to see Dev bring all of that to the collegiate level. She should be setting personal bests in college, in all of her events, and that’s what I want. That’s what we love to see as coaches.”
Faber, meanwhile, is focused the immediate future. She is looking forward to competing with some of the best athletes on the East Coast in the Penn Relays.
“I’m real excited for that,” she said. “I have big expectations for that meet. I’m really excited to see how it goes.
“It’s really cool to know I’m going to be competing against people that I really haven’t competed against before. It’s a new group of people in a new environment that is so electric. It’s the Penn Relays at Franklin Field. I have big hopes for it.”
Maintaining Balance
Though a jumper, Faber’s feet are planted firmly on the ground. Her favorite athlete, Anna Hall, is an Olympian. While she expects to improve in college, she knows that will not quite be her trajectory.
That’s why Duquesne, with a strong nursing program, also appealed to her.
“As much as I love track, I know I’m not going to be an Olympic athlete,” said Faber. “As much as I love it, I had to keep it in the back of my mind that I had to achieve a balance of what was going to help with track with what was going to have a degree afterward that was going to take me through the rest of my life. Their nursing program is definitely well-known, so that was a factor, too.”
While she did consider being a doctor and respects what they do, Faber witnessed how nurses are really the first line of defense when her grandmother was in the hospital over the summer.
“They are the ones who really get to connect with the people who are there,” said Faber, who currently thinks she might lean toward being a pediatric nurse. “That’s when I realized it was what I really wanted to do, which was to help people.”
Overall, Faber certainly fulfills the balance she seeks at CB South, taking AP and honors classes and boasting a 4.1 weighted GPA.
“It’s a natural fit,” said Gable. “Coaches can easily reference her. All the other kids know that all the hard work, and all the responsibility and the care that she puts into her athletics, she also puts into her academics. It’s like good karma. They both work with each other.”
Gable has also seen this firsthand, as he taught Faber in two science classes – chemistry and forensics.
“I have had the good fortune of teaching her in science class, and she’s brilliant,” he said. “She’s a hard worker. She really cares.
“Everything she does out on the track, I’ve seen her do in the classroom. She is that that picture perfect athlete that you want to use as an example for everybody else.”
Faber, who also holds down a part-time job at a local cookie store, admitted that it was initially strange having her coach as a teacher.
“It was a little weird at first, but he is a great teacher,” she said. “I don’t think I would have done as well if I didn’t have him. It was also really fun. We could joke around about track -- when we weren’t doing work -- so that was really nice.”
A Place to Land
To say Faber tried multiple sports before settling on track and field would be putting it mildly.
She said: “I tried basketball. I tried softball for a while. I tried gymnastics when I was younger. I tried soccer when I was younger.”
She credits CYO coach Ed Clark for getting her involved in track in sixth and seventh grade.
“He is the one who first started me with it, and he is the reason that I continued to do into middle school and then high school,” said Faber, who also extended gratitude to Gable and jumping coach Angelo LaFratta and her friends and teammates.
At the top of her list, though, is her family, beginning with mom and dad.
“My parents and my whole family have done and awful lot for me,” said Faber. “They have been at all of my meets. I sometimes get really nervous and psyched out, but they are always ready to do what’s best for me. I owe it all, or mostly all of it, to them.”
What was it about track that kept her in it?
“When I found track, what I think I loved about it was that it was an individual sport and I can hold myself accountable,” said Faber, who also plays pickleball for fun and enjoys country music. “While it’s an individual sport, it’s also a team sport. I always do my best when my teammates are all around me, cheering me on. You are accountable for your marks and your times, but you also have your team that you are cheering on.
“I think that’s what I love most about it.”
